K Bank Withdraws IPO... "To Resume When Market Conditions Improve"

Due to Internal and External Uncertainties and Stock Market Slump

No Concerns About Delayed Listing Due to Stable BIS Ratio

K Bank Withdraws IPO... "To Resume When Market Conditions Improve"

Internet-only bank K Bank has withdrawn its initial public offering (IPO). This is the second time K Bank's IPO has been canceled, following the previous attempt in 2023.

K Bank announced on the 8th that it has decided to postpone the ongoing IPO to properly evaluate its corporate value and will pursue it again in the future. K Bank had previously prepared for listing in 2022 but decided to postpone it in February 2023, considering the weakened investment sentiment.

K Bank passed the preliminary screening for listing in August last year and aimed to reattempt the IPO by the end of October.

The goal was to accelerate growth and enhance profitability by expanding the types and scale of loans through large-scale capital expansion and investing in three sectors: ▲Retail ▲SME/SOHO ▲Platform.

Due to demand forecasts falling short of expectations, the IPO scheduled for October last year was postponed to early this year, but this too was canceled.

K Bank plans to continuously increase its corporate value by focusing on external growth and profitability enhancement and will promptly resume the IPO once the stock market conditions improve.

As of the end of December last year, K Bank had 12.74 million customers, showing a steep growth trend with an increase of over 3.2 million in just one year. Financial performance also improved, with a net profit of 122.4 billion won recorded by the third quarter of last year, surpassing the annual record of 83.6 billion won in 2022, achieving both external growth and profit improvement.

At the end of the third quarter last year, K Bank's BIS total capital ratio was 14.42%, well above the regulatory ratio (11.5% by the end of 2024), and is being managed stably. Particularly, with the increase in the proportion of safe assets and the growth in net profit, the BIS total capital ratio has shown an improvement trend, rising for three consecutive quarters since the end of 2023 (13.18%), indicating no operational disruption due to the listing delay.

A K Bank representative stated, "We decided to postpone the listing as it became difficult to receive a proper corporate value evaluation due to the stock market slump caused by increased internal and external uncertainties," adding, "We will focus on continuous growth and profitability enhancement and promptly pursue the IPO again when market conditions improve."

Reporter Kim Bo-hyung kph21c@hankyung.com